Monday, December 10, 2007

Cocktail (1988)


Coughlin’s Diet: Cocktails & Dreams

When you think of the 80s, you think of Tom Cruise. There are films that won awards and brought him fame and fortune. However, Cocktail wasn’t one of those. Tom Cruise even won a Razzie Award for worst actor thanks to his part in this film. If you are a true Cruise fan, though, Cocktail is a lot of fun!
The young Brian Flanagan (Cruise) leaves the army in search of fortune in the big apple. He enrolls in business school and finds a job bartending for the very wise and witty Doug Coughlin (Brian Brown). Everything changes for Brian as Doug teaches him the ropes about women, drinking, and bartending. There are some really cool scenes with Doug and Brian performing “flair bartending.” Doug has an opinion on everything—Coughlin’s Law. Brian ends up ditching school to take on bartending full-time in hopes of opening his own bar in the near future. (Doug shares this goal as well.) Both Doug and Brian are money-driven. Brian’s dream bar is Cocktails and Dreams. An upscale club owner sees the show and hires the guys away to work for him. Brian falls for a sexy photographer (Gina Gershon), who ends up breaking up the team. Afterwards, Brian moves to Jamaica in order to earn enough money to open his bar.
Brian meets and falls in love with a beautiful tourist Jordan (Elisabeth Shue)—great chemistry between Cruise and Shue. Shaking things up, the newly married Doug shows up and bets Flanagan that he can’t get a rich tourist, who visits the bar, to sleep with him. The competition begins again. Brian sleeps with her, and of course, Jordan sees him leave the bar. The rest of the film is focused on Brian’s attempts to win back Jordan.
There are parts of the film which are dark and depressing, especially in the final scenes with Doug. There is an unexpected, creepy death scene. Brian Brown does an excellent job in this film. Brian and Doug have great chemistry and their troubled relationship is as important as Brian’s romance with Jordan. Cool soundtrack and great cast.

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